DayZ Creative Director Leaves Bohemia Interactive

Brian Hicks has been taking a back seat while other developers take charge.

With DayZ enroute to version .63 and the full release touted for this year, creative director Brian Hicks has announced his departure from Bohemia Interactive. Hicks revealed in a blog post that he was “no longer needed”, a point which creator Dean Hall had also reached at one point.

“With that said – I feel DayZ has reached a point in which I, much like how Dean felt years back – am no longer needed. I’ve spent years talking to you all, working with the team, and collaborating with Peter on where we want DayZ to be, how we want DayZ to feel.

“Now that you have started to see, and touch DayZ .63 I feel like our plans, our dreams are finally within grasp. Peter Nespešný and the design team have a rock-solid grasp of what DayZ is, and what it needs to be. All of our systems have been discussed, documented, and discussed again.”

Hicks revealed that over the past year, he had been working with Peter Nespešný in a design consultant role while taking more of a back seat and pushing other developers forward. “I won’t lie – it hasn’t been easy, and there have been times where Peter and I both were uncertain about how .63 would be received, or how it would perform under full-scale load. I don’t want to be a broken record – but I am so happy that all of those concerns have been washed away.”

DayZ has had its fair share of criticism over the years. Having released on Steam Early Access in December 2013, the survival title has been in perpetual development with constant delays, long-awaited features and a community that feels its feedback to have been ignored. DayZ is also supposed to release on Xbox One and PS4, which is just might before 2018 ends. However, once again, we’ll have to wait and see for ourselves.